Trunk Music

Edgar had gone into the woods at two-thirty. It was full daylight then and Powers hadn’t even been on duty yet. And the only car that had been in the area at the time was Rider’s. Bosch knew Powers was lying, and it was all beginning to fall into place. His finding the body, his fingerprint on the trunk, the pepper spray on the victim, the reason the bindings were taken off the wrists. It was already there, in the details.
    “How much earlier?” Bosch asked.
    “Uh, it was right after I came on duty. I can’t remember the time.”
    “Daylight?”
    “Yeah, daylight. Can you put the fuckin’ light down?”
    Bosch ignored him again.
    “What was the citizen’s name?”
    “I didn’t get it. Just some guy in a Jag, he waved me down at Laurel Canyon and Mulholland. Told me what he saw and I said I’d check it when I got the chance. So I was checking it out and saw the bag here. I figured it belonged to the guy in the trunk. I saw the bulletin you people put out about the car and the luggage, so I knew you were looking for it. Sorry I blew it, but you people should’ve let the watch commander know what you were doing. Jesus, Bosch, I’m going blind here.”
    “Yeah, it’s blown all right,” Bosch said, finally lowering the light. He lowered his gun to his side also but didn’t put it away. He kept it ready there, under the poncho. “Might as well pack it in now. Powers, go on up the hill to your car. Jerry, grab the bag.”
    Bosch climbed up the hill behind Powers, careful to keep the light up and back on the patrol cop. He knew that if they had cuffed Powers down by the tarp, they’d never get him up the hill because of the steep terrain and because Powers might fight them. So he had to scam him. He let him think he was clear.
    At the top of the hill, Bosch waited until Edgar came up behind them before making a move.
    “Know what I don’t get, Powers?” he said.
    “What, Bosch?”
    “I don’t get why you waited until dark to check out a complaint you got during the day. You’re told that two suspicious-looking characters went into the woods and you decide to wait until it’s late and it’s dark to check it out by yourself.”
    “I told you. Didn’t have the time.”
    “You’re full of shit, Powers,” Edgar said.
    He had either just caught on or had played along with Bosch perfectly.
    Bosch saw Powers’s eyes go dead as he went inside to try to figure out what to do. In that instant Bosch raised his gun again and aimed it at a spot between those two vacant portals.
    “Don’t think so much, Powers,” he said. “It’s over. Now stand still. Jerry?”
    Edgar moved in behind the big cop and yanked his gun out of its holster. He dropped it on the ground and jerked one of Powers’s hands behind his back. He cuffed the hand and then he did the other. When he was done, he picked up the gun. It seemed to Bosch that Powers was still inside, still staring blankly at nothing. Then he came back.
    “You people, you have just fucked up big time,” he said, controlled rage in his voice.
    “We’ll see about that. Jerry, you got him? I want to call Kiz.”
    “Go ahead. I got his ass. I hope he does make a move. Go ahead, Powers, do something stupid for me.”
    “Fuck you, Edgar! You don’t know what you’ve just done. You’re goin’ down, bro. You’re going down!”
    Edgar remained silent. Bosch took the Motorola two-way out of his pocket, turned it on and keyed the mike.
    “Kiz, you there?”
    “Here. I’m here.”
    “Come on over. Hurry.”
    “On my way.”
    Bosch put the two-way back and they stood there in silence for a minute until they saw the flashing blue light lead Rider’s car around the bend. When it pulled up, the lights swept repeatedly through the tops of the trees on the incline. Bosch realized that from below, down in George’s shelter, the lights on the trees might look as if they were coming from the sky. It all came to Bosch then. George’s spacecraft had been Powers’s patrol car. The abduction had been a traffic stop. The perfect way to get a man carrying nearly a half million in cash to stop. Powers had simply waited for Aliso’s white Rolls, probably at Mulholland and Laurel Canyon, then followed and put the lights on when they approached the secluded curve. Tony probably thought he had been speeding. He pulled over.
    Rider pulled off the road behind the patrol car. Bosch came over and opened the back door and looked in at her.
    “Harry, what is it?”